The University of Oregon heard from the NCAA last week on the Willie Lyles situation.
The rest of us heard about it in a typical Friday afternoon document dump. Bad news travels fast...
I highly doubt Oregon gets hammered in USC fashion, but I don't see them necessarily getting off easy either. It is pretty clear from reading the (highly redacted) document that this is hardly a mistake or a one time thing.
More here...
On Friday, Oregon released two draft versions of the same four-page document titled Proposed Findings of Violations, which was submitted by the NCAA to Oregon and released in heavily redacted form. The first draft was dated Dec. 16, 2011, and a second version, labeled Revised Draft for Discussion Purposes, was undated.
Both versions indicated that the two parties would agree that the football team’s relationships with three scouting services — including two that employed Lyles — from 2008 to 2011 were improper. However, the proposed agreement between the two bodies is only a point of discussion and not yet finalized.
Further, the draft document suggests that the NCAA and Oregon eventually could agree that the Ducks violated a rule that limits the number of coaches that can be involved in recruiting.
Perhaps most significantly — if the proposals were finalized — the Ducks and the NCAA would agree that, due to the "scope and nature" of the violations, "The athletics department failed to adequately monitor the football program’s use of recruiting or scouting services."
Lets get this out of the way first.
Oregon's "cooperation" will keep them form getting hammered hard. This is the sham that is the NCAA. Break major rules, get caught, provide some mea culpa or kiss ass or whatever and escape harsh penalties.
The NCAA only cares about "punishing" major rule breakers when it suits them. We have all seen them pull stuff out of thin air to make a case stick in the past.
More intriguing is the fact that this violations go back to to 2008. That puts Oregon in the repeat offender window.
he NCAA put the Oregon football program on probation for two years Wednesday for violations involving the recruitment of College of the Canyons running back J.J. Arrington in January 2003.
Oregon reported the violations and agreed with the sanctions. The Ducks do not lose any scholarships and remain eligible for bowl games, the NCAA said.
"We're trying to win the right way, and we're not going to cheat," Coach Mike Bellotti said. "I feel very bad about this because it happened under my watch."
Looks like playing by the rules in the recruiting wars is a bit of a problem in Eugene.
This is not a compliance issue as some will want you to believe. I find it difficult to believe that Oregon's compliance office would have let this fly if they knew.
Not for three years.
This is a case of a coaching staff of willingly and repeatedly breaking the rules. It is pretty clear that the staff at UO essentially paid these recruiting services for access to players.
Regardless of how it all ends up, it is pretty clear that Oregon cheated...doing so between 2008 through 2011. This is far worse than anything USC was accused of.
USC was hammered because they dominated the conference, had fun doing it and did it overtly. One extra coach (for one season, while Oregon did it for 2-3 seasons), recruiting dinners at the Taverna, not having a proper form filled out, excessive phone calls by a tennis player and allowing a known rules violator access to the basketball offices simply shows that some were not paying attention.
That's a far cry from members of a football staff willingly breaking the rules of one the NCAA's three "sacred pillars"....for THREE years!
Oregon WILL NOT get hammered like USC. But they cheated and they admit as much in the document. Oregon now is no different than some SEC schools.
Welcome to the club boys!!
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Some other links on this...
Pac-12 Confidential | Oregon and the NCAA: The plot thickens | Seattle Times Newspaper
Oregon still in NCAA gray area - Pac-12 Blog - ESPN
NCAA investigation preliminary finding: Oregon Ducks broke rules in 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011